and he notes -
While the prototype open end cars Kinsman used for the kits were
Boston & Maine equipment, they were not unique to that road. The New
Haven, Maine Central and Bangor & Aroostook also had them. Several
roads outside New England also used similar cars.
The prototypes were built by Laconia Car Co. in the 1880s mostly for
branch line and secondary trains. When steel cars were mandated early
in the 20th century, most of the New Haven cars were replaced and the
balance sold to the B&M/MeC where they augmented their existing fleet.
As time progressed most were relegated to back woods lines where they
lasted (at least on the B&M) until the end of steam on the branches
in 1953 which coincided with abandonment of passenger service on all
but the main lines and commuter trains out of Boston. Several of the
cars remained in service well into the 60s in work trains and I
believe a couple went to Edaville.
Sadly I witnessed the end for a dozen or so cars at B&M's Billerica
Shops. The cars were spotted on siding well away from the buildings,
pushed over on their sides by a front loader and burned. Any metal
that remained was salvaged and the trucks were sold to tourist lines.
An interesting note is the 'special' treatment the New Haven gave
some of their cars - they removed the outer sides and replaced them
with metal - scribed to look like wood. As the story goes, the NH had
to use steel equipment in and out of New York back in the early
century and not wanting to spend a lot of bucks on commuter cars,
they shopped several wooden cars cladding them in steel but the
public had fears of riding in steel cars lest a derailment bring the
cars in contact with the wires or third rail - so a mechanical
engineer came up with the idea of making the cars look like they had
wood sides and nobody knew the difference. There was one of these
cars used on a tourist line near Worcester back in the 80s
Raleigh in Raineigh Maineigh
At 02:05 PM 10/2/2011, Don Thompson wrote:
>
>
>Dear Darrell,
>I was told by the draftsman of the kits drawings, Bill Boucher that
>the prototype was the B&M wooden passenger cars that lasted much
>later than most mainline cars of this type. I am sure that Rollie
>would have more information on the prototype...
>Don Thompson
>
>On Oct 2, 2011, at 1:56 PM, Darrell wrote:
>
> > True, the Kinsman kits are very basic and "generic" in the
> one-size-fits-all sense and the detail level.
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